Giving Up vs. Letting Go

Description

Giving up means ceasing to pursue our goal. Letting go means we chase it while remaining unattached to the outcome. Here Kenton and Rebecca share a method of "going after things" that has proven highly effective for us.

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Music is "The Woods" by Silent Partner.

Tags: Kenton Whitman,ReWild University,Human Rewilding,personal rewilding,mindfulness,how to,bushcraft,survival,wilderness survival skills,how to survive in the woods

Video Transcription

[Music]

no my friend so this is an important one we've been thinking about doing this one together for quite a while a long time yeah it's and I think it's very broadly applicable the place where we get to see it in action a lot is kind of in survival type situations because when students come out to real wild University they they end up facing a lot of challenges and what we find is that it's it's easy to give up you know when you're when you're trying to do something that is beyond what you believe you are capable of doing it's really easy to give up and we kind of use our willpower to fight through that but many times I've seen where people give up when we give up you don't get that fire in the rain or you know when you're shivering and super cool I'm trying to do the Spartan cold fire challenge the fire it just it won't happen but there is something that can happen in this transformation that we've seen many times and you call it letting go letting go okay letting go giving up isn't it the same thing and then the end is sort of is semantics but in my mind it's separated out giving up is pushing your hand at something than saying I don't care it's turning your back on it and going in your own mind well it's not important I'm not gonna do it and in a way you're still attached just like when you just like someone you still are invested in them it's like Oh fine right whereas letting go is holding your your palms up and saying okay I cannot control this and I need to release I need to release my thoughts about how it should look about what I think and I need to just see what comes to me and so the letting go is an opening and the giving up physical and pushing away yeah that's when you first were talking to me about this and making this distinction it was it was hard for me to understand too because those those two ideas seem so the same but I think that this letting go is the thing that has gotten me through a lot of my survival challenges and you know the videos that you may have seen and it's also gotten a lot of students through things that they didn't think they could take on I put that pinecone in there because you know we're talking about having a goal whether whether that goal is to get that fire in the rain or that goal is to get your kids to school on time in the morning yeah whatever the project at work so many different things it isn't just survival out in nature its survival in life across the board and then trying to get things done that pinecone that's the goal and you've heard me talk about this before I probably you know we can hold that with our fists like this and then when we when we give up our hands open and the goal is lost and you can see this you know often I see it in people's eyes before they even begin a challenge and I can tell this is not this is not gonna happen they've already given up but well we can hold that pinecone and then open our hands like this we're still holding it but there's a release of that energy that's used in clenching that I think is where the magic happens because a lot of times and I'm glad you brought up getting your kids to school on time because we might laugh at that off that's not a problem but people from here really stressed about something like that and you feel all this weight and this pressure tension it's even physical and then what happens you you snap at people you make poor mistakes

you drop your only match for your one-match fire challenge and suddenly all of that wanting to control is working in the opposite direction and things are falling apart versus when you let go

there is a space and a breath a release and I really believe a receptivity that happens where we almost engage in a sixth sense of awareness where we can move smoothly and sometimes athletes talk about it or yeah yeah where you tap into a very different way of being you don't need your brain you don't need your controlling mind you simply need that letting go to be right where you are for me one of the cool things about this is that it gets us to believe in ourselves let's say you you want to quit your job and and you have this dream you want to go for it but it feels like jumping off a cliff and so that fear can keep us stuck in that job our entire life but when we jump off we do that in a letting go sense we do it in a way where we have to trust that we're gonna figure things out and we are all way more capable than we've been told we're smarter we're more creative more more resilient you know we're giving this message that were weak that we can't handle things but we we do have this inner power to do amazing amazing things and when we let go that clenching that unleashes that energy that was used for clenching and now it can be used for allowing these natural abilities that we have but that are usually suppressed by this constant clenching you are so capable we are also capable you are capable you are able to do things that you probably don't even realize you can do you have it in you and when you stay holding so hard and you let go then you become it's like you level up in a way and you might not even know it right away but if you give up if you say no I no longer care you shut down all your options and and I mean people talk about that in life and death they say I can tell the person who comes in I can see it they've already given up or I can tell they they were alive the moment they got here and then that was all they wanted and it's like I've seen that again when you talk about the challenges that students go through here it could be a challenge you present to them or it could just be something simple like okay I was cooking my meal and it fell into the fire there's ashes all over it it's a etc etc and you can start to see the shutting down and and then when there's a letting go that's been there light heartedness comes and you laugh and you think oh I'm gonna remember this forever and so it's it's that choice that you have in any given situation am I gonna give up I'm on put my hand up and say I'm totally done which isn't actually very fulfilling it doesn't actually give you the weightlessness it gives you a sense I feel it gives me a sense of disappointment a heaviness in my stomach of as though an opportunity was there and lost

whereas letting go brings me a light heartedness sets me into a place where I can succeed even if I don't accomplish my goal I have still succeeded because I have kind of maintained my Higher Self I'm walking that path that says okay life I'm with you you were that example I think came out of my father who was an ER physician and he would say that about people that often he would tell I could tell just based on this look in their eyes whether people were gonna make it or not you know if they were if they were trauma victims of a car accident or a gunshot wound or whatever it was and if it if it applies there it applies just as much in in our regular life and so what you said about you know this is a confusing part because just spent ah we gotta clean to that goal and if we let go of something in a way we have to release that goal and the way I usually do it as I say I'm gonna let this open up my hands I'm still going after that goal with everything I have everything I have so I'm still going for it but I'm not attaching myself to it I'm using that you know who knows what is good or bad there's that I'll try to link to that video if I can remember in saying that even though I'm going for this goal with all my energies I don't know that this goal is actually gonna bring me the fruits that I think so if something else comes that's okay for me that's the biggest trick to accomplishing this letting go and then I can go for it I'd be strong shooting for it and I'm not attached I'm not locked in that I need this going for it with joy with excitement it's totally game-changing as far as how we approach goals in our lives it opens up curiosity I love what you said about something else could come in because it's as though life becomes an unfolding story versus this sort of outline of to do and to make happen and whether it's in the woods and you're trying to make it through the night it's like as soon as we let go all sorts of different things that we didn't notice begin to happen and in a way it's a little whew mystical and I want to lie because doing this is scary but time and time again when I hear people say okay I did it and wow this is what happened it's far more than they ever could have lined up perfectly for themselves I think you hit on something important there because it's it's really fear-based the way we've been taught that clinging is fear-based and this other way this letting go is so open hearted and yeah it can it can seem in the way it sounds but in reality it's almost just about where your Energy's gonna go is your energy gonna go into are we gonna be cleaning grasping or is our energy gonna go into curiosity creativity resilience I just I feel well I grew really blessed and being able to see people go through a lot of these challenges and the looks on their faces when they come out the other side or something they feel like there's no way they could do it Simon's out here right now doing three nights and the in the woods no food no sleeping bag no tent just sitting in one small spot just himself in nature and a million mosquitoes and probably rain tonight and he's just gonna be there and that's gonna be a super powerful experience a lot of so think of I could never do that I wouldn't be capable of that cleaning we can but he's developed so much openness here so much ability to let go that my prediction at least is that he's gonna come out the other side of this with quite a story to tell oh he's gonna have gifts for himself and to share with other people I feel that the message really is you have it in you and the quickest route to that sometimes she's not organizing everything the way you think it is but stopping in that hectic morning when you're trying to get out the door and everything's so important and stopping for one moment and saying what if what if I'm the mom whose kids are late all the time but I'm the mom who knows what her kids love who's there with them who has the time and it's like choose what it is that's important and as you let go the things that really matter step into your life more they show up and soon it is enriched with that so here's how to do it if you want to try it first believe in yourself you only said it before right in this video you are creative you are powerful you are resilient

you are strong believe because you are and if you put yourself out there a little bit you're gonna have to exercise those abilities and though that's scary you're going to rise up to meet that you're strong enough to do it whatever your goal is ahead of you see if you can think about it even if you feel really serious about it okay you're you got that interview tomorrow and you really want that job see if you can let it go and realize you know what I'm gonna go in for that interview I'm gonna have fun I don't need to get that job another better one might come up the next day so I'm just gonna go into it with that open-heartedness I'm gonna go for it I'm gonna do my best I'm not gonna be attached to a result that is that that magic of unattached you've heard about it in some wisdoms traditions and such it doesn't mean we're not doing things anymore doesn't mean we don't love people it doesn't mean we don't care about things and we're not reaching for things it does mean that we don't need to have that thing in order to feel fulfilled you realize that life is filled with twists and turns and that goal that you're going after may not bring you the fruits that you want something else might be much more incredible then go for it we want to hear about your experiences with this if you've had experiences with blood and goes this is I know this one's a little bit deeper but I know you all can go there and so if you have experimented with letting go what is that felt like it could be any place in your life it could be in your modern world life it could be a survival or camping or nature experience where all of a sudden it dawned on you hey why am I trying so hard to do this and something else entirely happen so all those stories would love to hear and and your wisdom your thoughts it's valuable for us it's valuable for all the people in the comments it's amazing please share this is a secret superpower that all of us have inside of us let's talk about it let's unleash it let's see what it can do and if these videos are valuable to you if you get something out of them if they touch you in some way or they have something that pops into your head later on and you think hey wow I am so glad I saw that consider becoming a patron for us on patreon we could use you standing beside us and it's it's as easy as a dollar a month us $12 a year and that helps us to do more of this to reach out more to stand with you and to change this whole environment now we're in to make it more nourishing for everybody thank you friends [Music]